


Dean Winchester Is a Douchebag

by teyla



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Canon Compliant, Castiel Doesn't Understand Idioms, Castiel Watches TV, Castiel in the Bunker, Dean Apologizes, Dean Winchester Pines Over Castiel, Developing Relationship, Fix-It of Sorts, Gen, Implied/Referenced Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, John Winchester's A+ Parenting, M/M, Shojo - Freeform, Team Free Will
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-11-16
Updated: 2015-11-16
Packaged: 2018-05-01 20:24:35
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 9,342
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5219591
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/teyla/pseuds/teyla
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Step 5: Admit to ourselves and others the exact nature of our wrongs.</p><p>Unexpectetly robbed of his main coping skill (alcohol), Dean has to face some truths about himself and draw the consequences.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Dean Winchester Is a Douchebag

**Author's Note:**

> This is set somewhere around 11x04 to 11x06 and was written for [destielficletchallenge 2015](http://destielficletchallenge.tumblr.com/post/131832801516/boo-is-it-time-again-it-is). My prompt was "shojo". I ignored Supernatural's version of the shojo and went with something based more closely on the original Japanese myth (because it's cooler).
> 
> No Dean bashing. Just Dean taking responsibility for his fuck-ups. Dean is my bb. For (spoilery) trigger warnings see notes at the end of the fic. If you want to find me on tumblr, I'm [teyla](http://t-eyla.tumblr.com/) over there as well.
> 
> Huge thanks to [Kat](http://punkascas.tumblr.com/) for kicking ass as my last-second beta. Kudos are great, comments are greater. Thanks for reading & have fun.

Dean hadn't thought this through.

While recovering in the bunker, Cas had way too much time to spend on the computer. The hours he didn’t waste on Netflix he spent reading up on human customs. So, when Halloween rolled around, Cas insisted they follow tradition and spend the night at a haunted house. Dean wasn’t exactly enamored by the idea, but arguing with Cas when Cas set his mind on something was like beating your head against a brick wall, so eventually Dean gave in. He figured it wouldn't be so bad. After all, spending the night at an abandoned house with his brother and his angel wasn't that different from any other night on the job.

That was when he thought Sam would be coming along. Sam, however, announced he had plans. He wouldn't share what those plans were (which meant it was either a girl or one of those movies Sam liked with no shot under two minutes and the characters speaking a combined total of ten words); he just pointed out that he was going to need the car. But he would drop Dean and Cas off. No problem.

Dean had rarely resented his brother's smug face more than he did in that moment.

So now here he was, in an abandoned farm house in the middle of Nowhere, Kansas, slouching on a spread-out sleeping bag with his back against the wall, beer in hand. The display of Sam's laptop was flickering about four feet away, and Cas was sitting right next to him. They were watching _The Evil Dead_ , but as much as Dean was a fan of the classics, the movie couldn't hold his attention. His thoughts kept straying, startled into contemplation by the fact that he and Cas were actually spending time together. It’d been a long time since they’d done that. Between the Mark and his detour into the Land of Douchery and Black Eyes, and before that, Cas' stint as Heaven's mind-controlled puppet, the last time he and Cas had been able to take a moment for just the two of them had been over three years ago. In Purgatory. _Fuck_. Their lives were ridiculous.

Dean almost regretted having brought the laptop. He'd packed it with the specific intention to avoid long stretches of silence—or, worse, too-serious conversations about all the things he and Cas never spoke about. Right now, he almost wished they could have those conversations. Anything would be better than sitting here and struggling with the acute awareness that if he wanted to put his arm around Cas, all he had to do was reach out.

He really hadn't thought this through at all.

"I gotta take a leak." His voice echoed in the dusty corners of the room. The house wasn't actually haunted; he'd made sure to pick one where one look at the local lore had convinced him it really was just an old, abandoned farm house. But the cobweb-covered room with the dirty windows was a little spooky, anyway. He glanced over at Cas, who was sitting there like cast from marble. Dean never saw anyone watch movies with the same intensity Cas mustered for anything from Disney to Michael Haneke.

"All right, Dean." Cas' voice was deep and soothing as usual. "You should hurry back. I don't believe Natalie cutting off her arm truly prevented her from getting infected."

"Good instincts there, Spielberg.” Dean clambered to his feet. “Tell me all about it when I get back.”

"Of course."

The words rang in Dean's ears as he made his way to the front door. _Of course_. Cas said it with such implicitness, no matter what Dean was asking. _Tell me about the parts of the movie I missed. Stay on the phone while I make you wait. Join me on this risky hunt. Risk your life and give up everything you love because I ask you to_. And all Cas would say was ‘of course’.

These kind of thoughts weren't new, but tonight they were particularly loud. He blamed the couple shots of whiskey he'd downed before settling down with Cas, and the beers he'd put away over the course of the evening. He'd hoped the alcohol would relax him, but it had done the opposite and lifted the cast-iron lid he usually kept on those thoughts. Dragged up memories he hadn't allowed himself to think about for years.

As he stepped out into the cool October air, he briefly allowed himself a chance to reminisce. There was something really fucked up about the fact that he was getting nostalgic about Purgatory. It had been a shitty place; it stunk of rotting wood and rotting flesh, and it had stripped him down to his core—a hunter, a killer. As a human, he allegedly didn't belong there, but the truth was that while there, he'd felt more distant from his humanity than ever. 

In other ways, though, Purgatory had been paradise. No fear, no doubt, no hemming and hawing over the moral justification of his actions and decisions. Just monsters on the one side, and his people on the other. Benny and Cas. Primarily Cas.

As he walked along the house, his eyes trailed over the shadowy line of trees in the distance, and he wondered if there was any way to recreate that unambiguous feeling here in the living world. In Purgatory, he'd known without a doubt that he needed Cas. That Cas was _important_. In contrast, the things he felt about Cas here in the living world were nowhere near clear-cut. They hadn't been three years ago, and now, after everything that happened, they were an obscure mess, and were getting buried in guilt, regret, and hopelessness.

Not that he didn’t deserve that. The rest of his life was going to be spent on trying to keep the repercussions of his fuck-ups to a minimum. Making his feelings for Cas a priority was a luxury he was never going to be able to afford.

He’d found a secluded spot to do his business and was putting himself away when he heard a low, grating sound from above. Looking up, he saw two dark shapes rushing towards him. He quickly ducked sideways, stumbling as his foot caught on some vines. The objects clattered as they hit the ground right next to him.

"Shit!" He glanced up, but no more projectiles were dropping from the sky. Using his phone as a flashlight, he crouched down to inspect the objects, and found that they were two pieces of rotting, moss-covered asphalt. Apparently, the house had dropped a couple of shingles on him. He huffed a breath as the brief moment of shock dissipated. _Maybe it didn't enjoy getting pissed on_. At least they hadn’t hit him.

He checked his phone for messages as he walked back, but there were none. Hopefully that meant Sam was too busy having a good time to check in. He took the porch steps two at a time, and stopped as he hit the landing. The front door, which had earlier been a weathered, beaten-up piece of wood lopsidedly hanging off its hinges, was now intact; a solid wall that separated him from the inside of the house. From Cas. _Crap_. He reached out to try the knob, but it wouldn't turn. No surprise there.

"Is it because it's Halloween?" he asked, addressing whatever entity had decided that tonight was a good time to pay a visit to this house. "That's damn cliché of you."

A few steps further down the porch brought him to what used to be the living room window. Jagged shards of glass lined the bottom edge closest to the latch. He pulled his jacket sleeve over his hand and reached in carefully, fingers groping for the small metal knob. The latch opened after some nudging, and the window slid up. He hoisted himself up and clambered inside. Using the window frame to steady himself, he straightened up, when suddenly, the window dropped down, catching his hand underneath and snapping the knuckle of his index finger in the wrong direction.

Dean let out a howl. "Motherfucker!" He cradled his hand to his chest, and heard footsteps hurrying down the hallway.

"Dean?" Cas came rushing in, trench coat flapping behind him. "Dean. Are you all right?"

"Fine." He gritted his teeth and held his hand out in front of him. Tendons tightened painfully, and he winced at the scrapes on his knuckles. The finger looked like it was going to bruise. It was probably sprained. "Fucking place's haunted. And whatever’s haunting it apparently hates me." He held up his hand for Cas to see, eyes narrowed in righteous anger.

Cas crossed the room and took Dean's fingers in his hand. Dean hissed a breath through his teeth, the concern in Cas' eyes shifting something in his chest. He tugged on his hand, but Cas wouldn't let go.

"It is a haunted house, Dean. I assumed an encounter with a spirit was within the realm of possibility."

"Well, it shouldn't have been." Dean tugged on his hand again, and Cas' grip tightened, sending a twinge of pain along Dean's nerves. The feeling changed and shifted, and Dean experienced the by now familiar sensation of bones, blood and tendons rearranging themselves under his skin. The ache in his hand disappeared, and with it the dry, slightly-too-cool feeling of Cas' fingers. Dean frowned. "You didn't have to do that."

"I know." Cas' expression, as always, gave nothing away. "Why would you say that a haunting in a haunted house is an unexpected occurrence?"

"I picked this house precisely because I was sure it wasn't haunted." Dean flexed his fingers, testing. They were good as new. "I didn't want to spend the night chasing a ghost, I just wanted to have some beers, watch some horror flicks and—"

"Netflix and chill."

Dean's words caught in his throat. "Where'd you pick that up?"

"It’s a saying the patrons of twitter-dot-com use. It describes recreational time spent with a friend watching television shows, movies or, well, Netflix."

Dean stared at Cas, opening his mouth to explain how that was _not_ what the phrase meant, but then closed it again. The way he’d felt earlier about sitting in Cas’ immediate proximity was too ambiguous for him to want to field questions about why what they’d been doing didn’t constitute as ‘Netflix and chill’. He cleared his throat. "Something like that, yeah." He glanced around the room, only too aware that standing here talking about Internet memes made them walking targets. "Anyway, looks like it's gonna be a job, after all. Sam's got the Impala with all the stuff. I don't even have the EFM meter on me. Any chance your angel spidey sense can pick up the location of ghosts? Or, ideally, their remains?"

Cas' narrowed eyes seemed to indicate he didn't appreciate his abilities being referred to as a spidey sense. Or maybe he was just wondering what spiders had to do with it. Either way, he didn't comment, just took a few steps into the center of the room and tilted his head as if to listen. The scattered shadows falling through the broken windows drew a pattern on his face, and Dean felt a chill creep up his spine. In the uneven light, Cas himself looked haunted—or maybe more scarred, gashes and cuts all over his face that had healed to form jagged, uneven lines. Dean knew it was just a trick of the light and his guilty conscience, but he still turned his eyes away.

"There is definitely a presence in the house." Cas was looking at him, seeming distracted as if he were still trying to listen for pings on the Ghost Radar. "I'm not certain what it is, though. Its tempo-spatial displacement differs from that of a vengeful spirit."

Dean blinked, kicking himself for never having taken Cas on a ghost hunt before. "You can tell what it is just by putting your ear to the ground?"

"It's not an auditory signal. But yes. Sensing the presence of spirits is not too different from sensing the presence of humans or demons. After all, they all are, or formerly were, human souls."

"Right." Dean nodded. "But you're saying that's not what it is?"

Cas' eyes tracked across the room. "I don't think it's human. Or ever was. But it is a spiritual entity. Which means—" Cas broke off. Dean waited, but instead of continuing, Cas abruptly turned around and set off for the door, giving Dean no choice but to follow.

"Means what, Cas? What're we dealing with?"

Cas marched his way down the hallway towards the stairs. It seemed like he was tracking something, his fast pace forcing Dean to jog a couple of steps to keep up. "Dean, is it common that a house like this is just left abandoned? Not just by humans, but by spirits as well?"

"Uh." Dean frowned as he thought about that for a moment. "I dunno. I guess most empty homes have some sort of haunting going on. Especially out in the middle of nowhere like here. If it's not a former tenant, it's some dead cowboy who's been haunting the land for centuries. Why?"

Cas didn't reply, just led them further up the stairs until they ended up on the narrow steps leading up to the attic. There he stopped so suddenly that Dean almost tripped over him and had to steady himself on the handrail. "Goddammit, Cas!" He glared up at Cas, who was towering a couple of steps above him, the steep incline creating a considerable height difference. "What are we dealing with? What's up here?"

Cas held up a hand. Dean, too startled at being shushed to protest, narrowed his eyes and watched Cas’ profile as he tilted his head again. When the silence stretched too far, Dean shifted. "Hear anything?"

Cas threw him an annoyed glance, concentration broken. "I believe we're dealing with a creature of some sort. A spiritual entity, but solid. Flesh and blood. I am trying to ‘hear’ where the spiritual hold it has on the property is strongest."

Dean could practically see the scare quotes when Cas used 'hear' to describe what he was doing, but ignored them. "It's got a spiritual hold on the house? What's that mean?" He frowned at the slight whine in his own tone, uncomfortable. He was beginning to feel like he was an apprentice on Cas' hunt, not the other way around.

"It means this entity has staked a claim on this house. Which explains why no other spirit has ever tried to, uh. Move in."

"There’s nothing in the local records, though." Dean tried to take a step up the stairs to get on eye level with Cas, but with the staircase as narrow as it was, all he managed to do was to shove himself against Cas' side. The confused glance Cas threw him made his ears grow warm, and he fell back into his original position. "If something lives here, why’s it never killed or maimed anyone?"

"Dean, not every spiritual entity's foremost goal is to trap and endanger humans. It is possible that this creature simply lives here." Cas' eyes were on the attic door. "If it does, I believe its lair, for lack of a better word, is up here."

"Why?" Dean's skin was starting to crawl. He hated the thought that some _thing_ had had its lair right above his and Cas' heads while they'd obliviously been having a movie night. _Thirty-odd years as a hunter, and you still can't do a simple location check._

"Because I can feel its presence most strongly here." Cas started up the stairs, and it took him reaching for the door knob for Dean to realize that he was intending to simply walk in there.

"Whoa!" He followed Cas up the stairs and grabbed Cas' trench by the shoulder. "Whoa there, John Wayne. Hold your horses."

"Dean, I am just—"

"We don't do it like this." Dean pulled to make Cas take a step down the stairs. They were narrow, but not too narrow for him to slip past Cas and take point. Cas gave him a narrow-eyed glare from his new position on the step below, but Dean ignored it. This was safer. Cas didn't have to like it; he just needed to go along with it. "We're not simply walking in there. There's no such thing as _neutral_ when it comes to monsters, Cas, all right?"

He reached around to pull his gun from the waistband of his jeans, cocking it with one hand as his other reached for the door knob. "If we're going in there, we're going in to fight, not to have a conversation.”

Without giving Cas a chance to reply, Dean twisted the knob. The door opened with a creak and he stepped inside, gun at eye-level, ready to shoot anything that moved. It wasn't his most sophisticated plan—he had no idea what the thing was and how to kill it, after all—but in his experience, bullets would at least slow down solid flesh-and-blood monsters.

The attic, however, was disappointingly anti-climactic. A high room with slanted walls, moonlight shining through the holes in the roof and bathing the wooden floor in a broken pattern of shadows. Apart from cobwebs, a few boxes and a couple of pieces of dusty farm furniture, there was nothing in here. Dean took a step forward, eyes darting into every corner to make sure he wasn't overlooking anything.

"Cas, I don't think your spidey sense—" — _is working right_. Before he could finish his sentence, a sharp draft of air followed by a loud bang interrupted him. He spun around, trigger finger tightening, and saw that the door had slammed shut. His stomach dropped. "Cas?"

"Dean!" Cas' voice was muffled, and the door rattled as Cas banged against it. "Dean, are you all right?"

"I'm fine. There's nothing here, Cas, are you sure—" Again, he didn't get to finish his sentence. His words dissolved into a shout as a tight line of pressure circled around his ankles. He jerked the gun down, a voice in the back of his mind shouting a warning not to shoot himself in the foot. The next moment, his feet jerked backwards. The floor rushed towards him as he lost his balance, but the pull on his ankles didn't let off. Instead of eating a mouthful of floor dust, the room made a sickening tilt backwards, his vision flipping on a horizontal axis as his feet were yanked up. Gravity pulled his arms down as his feet rushed towards the ceiling, his grip on the gun starting to slip. "Fuck, _no_ —"

Bile rose in his throat as his feet slammed into one of the ceiling beams. The jolt sent searing pain through his ankles and knees and gave the last push needed to make the weight of his weapon slide through his fingers. It tumbled into the depth, at least six feet until it hit the floor. A deafening bang made him curl in on himself—the gun had gone off on impact. Suspended under the ceiling with the upwards momentum still in his bones, he swung forwards as he twisted his body away from the sound. His arms flailed as he tried to counteract the movement, and he only just caught a glimpse of something shaggy and red flinging itself towards him before he crashed face-first into the central girder that ran across the attic about six feet underneath the roof ridge. It felt like getting punched by Mike Tyson wearing wooden gloves, and he barely had time to finish his last thought— _don't fucking throw up!_ —before the attic dropped away into darkness.

\----

He came to with the taste of iron in his mouth. His head was heavy, blood pounding between his temples, and his hands felt hot and swollen, hanging down above his head. He was still upside down.

He groaned and tried to catch a glimpse of the floor. Immediately he wished he hadn't done that. This damn attic was built more like a ball room, the ceiling at least fifteen feet at its highest point. Dean's lowest point, which happened to be the tips of his middle fingers, were about five feet up in the air. Enough to do some damage if he were to fall, but not enough to give him time to turn in the air and minimize the chance of broken bones or a broken head. Perfect.

"Cas?" The word came out as a croak. He tried to swallow, but without the assistance of gravity only managed to snort saliva into his nose. He spluttered, stilling his movements on the central girder as he began to swing back and forth. "Cas!"

"Your friend is busy."

The voice made him jump. "Who's there?"

He heard it before he saw it; the click of dull claws against wood. A rough, thick coat of fur brushed over his fingers, and he snatched his hand back. Then the thing dropped into his vision—a grotesque, smiling grimace with small slits of human eyes and full lips, framed by shaggy, red hair that seemed to be floating mid-air only inches from his face. Dean recoiled. "Jesus!"

The thing chuckled. Its voice was a lisping hiss. "No, not quite."

It swung away towards the opposite part of the slanted ceiling. As more of it came into view, Dean saw it was something akin to an orangutan—smaller and more slender, but with long limbs and a red coat that covered its entire body. Only its round face seemed human, which gave it a frankenstein-esque look. Dean curled his lip in disgust. "What, then? King Louie? You gonna sing me a song 'bout how you wanna be like me?"

The too-human features pulled into a grin. "Why would I want to be like you? You're not a good man."

The words cut deeper than they should. Dean stayed silent for a moment, trying to regain his cool. He'd been incredibly stupid to just walk in here without a clue what he was dealing with. "What did you do to Cas?"

"Cas is busy."

"What does that _mean_?"

The creature didn't reply, just looped a long-fingered hand over a crossbar and dropped from the beam it had been crouching on. Dean hoped the beam would break and send the thing plunging towards the floor, but no such luck. "Tell me where Cas is. Right now."

"Cas is saving you. He can hear you scream and beg, but he doesn't know how to reach you."

"What?" Dean snapped, exasperated. "Look, just—" He swung back and twisted. If he could just get down, he'd be able to grab his gun and make a run for it. "Cas said you live here. Do you want us out of here?"

He peered up into the darkness, trying to gauge the momentum it would take him to lunge up and grab the knife from his boot.

"Do you want out of this?" Strong fingers closed around his legs as the thing leaped onto him as if he were a set of monkey bars. He let out a startled yell, and felt the thing's skittish weight clamber up his legs. "You're a stubborn man, Dean. You don't like feeling helpless. Do you?"

"Fuck you." Dean gritted his teeth and braced a hand against the beam to steady himself. "What do you want?"

"Answer me." The creature's weight lifted, only to crash back down and twist his ankle, sending a jolt through his body. Dean growled in pain. "Do you feel helpless? Do you? Do you?" 

"Yes!” Dean snapped through clenched teeth. “Yes. I feel helpless. Happy?"

He could feel long fingers glide over his ankle, nudging up his jeans. Dry, fuzz-covered skin brushed against his own as the creature's fingers snuck into his boot to pull the knife out. 

"No, Dean. Not happy." It clambered its way down his body and leaned on his belt, its long-toed feet pressing against his chest. "Do you know what I am?"

He could reach up and grab it, throw it to the floor, then go for the second knife and cut himself loose. But it had a weapon now. He really didn't want to give it a reason to plunge the blade into his stomach. "I have no fucking clue. Why don't you enlighten me?"

The creature laughed, a chittering, high-pitched sound that sent a chill through Dean's body. "I'm a shojo. I enlighten many people."

Dean had no clue what that was supposed to mean, but he did know what a shojo was. "You're an alcohol spirit? But I can see you." And he wasn't drunk. The slight buzz from earlier had dissipated.

The thing laughed harder and bounced up and down against his chest until it leaped off of him and flung itself to the opposite wall. The momentum left Dean spinning, and he had to close his eyes to avoid motion sickness overtaking him. Blindly, he groped for the girder and steadied himself. When he opened his eyes, the shojo was back on the ceiling beam, knife held by its side. Dean bared his teeth at it. “I’m going to fucking end you.”

"You shouldn't get angry. Drinking makes you angry, doesn't it?" The creature raised the knife and started to dig the blade into the wall. Flakes of rotting wood crumbled down beside it. “Drinking made your father angry.”

The taste of bile burned in his throat. He wanted to twist the creature’s neck until it stopped talking. “If you have a point, _please_ get to it.”

“Your father still haunts you.” The shojo plunged the knife into the ceiling and left it there as it swung itself back over. Paws wrapped around the girder, and the creature’s grinning face dropped into his vision, too close for comfort. “Dead for eight years, but you still hear his voice in your head.”

“I don’t.” That was mostly true. The words in his head that used to belong to John— _don’t disappoint me, son; take care of Sammy; don't fail; do better; do_ more—weren't John's anymore. Sometimes they were Sam’s. Sometimes, rarely, they belonged to Cas. Most of the time, they were his own.

The shojo stared at him with a vacant grin. He could reach out and grab a hold of its neck, try to strangle it. As if it were reading his mind, it snarled and swung its legs forward to slam its feet into his chest.

“You think you’re a hunter, but you’re not!” Its high-pitched voice echoed through the attic as it flung itself upwards and clambered away, obscuring itself in the shadows. “You’re a ghost like your father. You're haunted by the shadows of your own choices, Dean. You should hunt yourself.” His body jolted and shook as the shojo dropped onto his legs from above, and he squirmed at the feeling of long fingers groping their way down towards his head. As it got closer, he could smell it—a combination of vinegar and alcohol with the dead odor of rotting meat underneath. Long limbs wrapped around his torso, its warm breath against his stomach where his shirt had ridden up. He tilted his head back as far as he could, trying to get away from the dead, musky smell. “You should rid the world of your anger, your poor choices. Your guilt. There’s nothing left of you but regret, Dean.”

“That’s not true.” The words came out thin. His chest tightened as the feeling of being trapped threatened to overwhelm him.

“Is it not, Dean? Do you not regret your actions? The ways you’ve hurt your brother. The ways you’ve hurt your _friend_.” The creature laughed softly. “Guilt is a poison, Dean. You can’t hold on to it so tightly and expect it not to turn you into a ghost. Or worse.”

“It’s already done that.” The words passed his lips before he could help it, accompanied by the memory of black smoke clinging to his bones, permeating every part of him and obliterating his judgment.

“And still you won’t let go.” The shojo tightened its grip. “Shojos do not judge, Dean. But they do not forgive, either. We rid the world of ghosts."

Dean knew what the shojo was saying. It deemed him too broken to have any fighting chance at redemption. He couldn't say that the thought hadn't crossed his own mind more than once. Right now, though, his heavy, swollen hands weighing him down and his blood pulsing between his temples, all he could think about was Cas. Cas, who would never forgive himself for having made them spend the night here if anything were to happen to Dean.

"Look, my friend—Cas. He’s right outside. If you gotta rid the world of me, don't do it tonight. All right? Do it when Cas won't be able to blame himself." He swallowed and grit his teeth. He hated begging, but this was Cas. "Please."

The shojo swung softly back and forth, a dead weight clamped onto his body. The silence was worse than being laughed at had been. His plea rung in his ears, the echo expanding to huge dimensions in his head. Baby. Crybaby. Just for this weakness alone, he probably deserved to die.

The creature's sudden movement startled him deeply. The pull on his body suddenly tripled as it flung itself upwards, laughing as it went, a wild, chittering whooping that sounded less like laughter and more like crazed excitement. Dean clapped his hands over his ears and curled forward, just in time to lose the counterweight of whatever was keeping his feet tethered to the ceiling. For a split-second, he was free-floating. Then the weight of his body pulled downwards and he fell, the floor rushing towards him at a sickening speed.

His ass broke the fall, which was probably the best scenario he could have hoped for. It still hurt like a bitch, the pain doubling as his elbow slammed into the floor. Momentum flung him around onto his back, wind knocked out of him as the decaying roof tilted and eventually settled into focus. He peered into the darkness, but there was nothing there: no rope, no monkey-like creature, not even a glimpse of movement as the shojo moved out of sight. It was just a large, dusty attic, dipped in shadows and dimly illuminated by broken beams of moonlight.

"Dean!" 

The attic door flew open with a bang. Dean sat up too quickly, nausea making his stomach roll. He learned forward just in time, but his gagging reflex brought up nothing but some retching. The room was spinning, so he felt Cas before he could really make him out, a cool hand against the back of his neck as Cas crouched down beside him. "Dean. Are you all right?"

"I'm fine." He blinked a few times. Cas' concerned face was right beside him, too close for comfort as he felt himself reminded of the creature's smiling grimace. But this was Cas. He grabbed a handful of Cas’ trench. "Turns out the thing that lives here is a shojo. Japanese alcohol spirit." He grimaced, contorting his face to test for swollen cheeks and broken bones. Oddly enough, it didn't feel like there were any.

Cas was watching him in confusion. "Why are you—pulling faces?"

"I'm not—" He frowned and looked down at his hands. The moonlight was bright enough to show that his knuckles were completely unharmed. He raised his hands to his face, but all he could feel was smooth skin—some stubble around his jaw, but no bruising or congealed blood. "It had me up under the ceiling. Upside down hanging by my feet. It gave me this long speech."

"Dean—" Cas‘ eyes narrowed. "When did it do that?"

"What do you mean?"

"You were in here for forty-six seconds precisely. That leaves time for a speech of about a hundred words." Cas paused, then frowned when Dean only stared at him in confusion. "That isn't much, even if it may sound like a lot. An average sentence has seventeen words, so it could have said no more than six sentences. Which isn’t a 'long speech'. Besides, if you say it had you, uh, up under the—"

"Cas." Cas fell silent. Dean wet his lips. The taste of blood in his mouth was gone, too. "I was in here for at least—twenty minutes. Maybe longer. Time flies when you're getting your head fucked with." He started to get up. Cas was on his feet before him and held out a hand, which Dean gratefully accepted. Even if his face was apparently completely healed, he wasn't sure if he'd already regained his sea legs.

"I'm not familiar with the lore around shojos. I believe Sam mentioned an encounter once."

"This was different." Walking was all right, so Dean started to make his way towards the door, Cas trailing behind him. He picked up his gun on the way. The knife was still up in the ceiling beam, and that was where it was going to stay. Like hell was he going to climb back up there just to get it. "The last one we met was just out for revenge. I have no idea what this one wants." He pulled the door open, but waited until Cas was right behind him to step through. He wasn't going to risk getting separated again. "We gotta figure out how to kill it."

"It's moot. The creature is gone."

"It—what?" Dean wasn’t sure if the news made him feel pissed or secretly relieved. "It just up and disappeared?"

"Its presence lifted thirty-eight seconds after the attic door fell shut. I was—" Cas broke off and threw him a glance. Dean wasn't sure how to read the glint in Cas' eyes. "—concerned," Cas continued. "For a moment I thought it had taken you with it as it vanished." 

Dean felt a twinge of guilt. Cas had been concerned, but actually, he should be pissed. He’d have every right to be for what Dean did, barging into that attic like that and getting himself trapped. If he'd let Cas go first, he doubts things would've gone the way they did. The shojo seemed powerful, but stringing an angel up by his feet was still a whole different kind of pay-grade. They'd reached the bottom of the stairs, and Dean clapped a hand on Cas’ back as he headed towards the room where they'd left Sam's laptop. "I'm fine. Let’s call Sam, ask him to pick us up. I'm about ready to get out of here."

It turned out that Cas had already texted Sam, so after collecting their things, they went to sit on the porch steps to wait. It was colder than the inside of the house, but Cas didn't feel it, and Dean had had about enough of this place. He wanted to be under an open sky. The jittery tension was slowly starting to leave his bones, but he knew it was going to be several days before he stopped jumping at every movement he picked up in the corners of his eyes. Not that this was anything new. He'd just have to wait it out. Sharing a companionable silence with Cas while they waited was a start.

He stayed away from the beer, though. There were still about seven cans left. Usually, it would help calm him down. Not tonight, though. Tonight, he preferred staying sober.

\----

Turned out that his preference to stay sober was longer-lasting. The following weeks, any time he went up to the fridge to grab a beer, he heard the shojo's cackling laughter echo through his head, and suddenly swallowing a mouthful of termites seemed more enticing than drinking anything alcoholic. Most of the time, he would grab something else—anything within reach would do. He'd even grabbed a raw carrot once and found that they actually made a very satisfying noise when you bit into them.

Comfort eating brought momentary distraction, but it wasn’t a solution. He'd always accepted drinking a little too much in exchange for avoiding a million thoughts in his head pointing out his failures. Now, with no way to deflect or silence them, they kept pouring in. 

Nights were worst. He'd lie awake, his brain cycling through replays of the past years' greatest hits, trying to figure out if the people he'd killed and the people he'd saved balanced out. Once or twice, he tried to think about letting Sam be possessed, and telling Cas to leave when Cas had been human and in need. Those thoughts were the most paralyzing, trapping him in his head and making it near impossible to leave his bed in the morning, let alone his room.

Despite his efforts to hide it, his struggles didn’t go unnoticed by either of his housemates. Sam didn't say anything, but Dean knew the concerned-upset frown Sam directed at him when he thought Dean wouldn't notice. Cas was his blunt self about it and pointed out one morning that according to what he knew about human sleep requirements, Dean had recently built up a deficit of eighty-four hours. Dean avoided giving him a straight answer, but doing so left him with an empty pit in his stomach. It wasn’t like Cas or Sam were trying to make him feel cornered. They were worried, and in all honesty, Dean didn’t know why he rejected their concerns. Normal people appreciated their family taking an interest.

He couldn’t shake the thought that the shojo was right. Maybe he was just a ghost; a walking personification of guilt and regret. Maybe he was like his father.

In the dead hours of one morning, Dean tried to figure out what he _really_ remembered about his dad. Examining the anecdotes he’d tell about him—moments that captured the spirit of a man who’d loved his family and did the best he could until he eventually sacrificed his life for them—Dean realized they felt about as real as his recurring dream about John teaching him how to drive. He wasn’t sure they’d actually happened. Memories of his father he was sure were real featured a sad, broken man, an alcoholic who struggled to even smile without regret creeping into the expression, and who had no space in his heart for anything but anger and guilt.

The man Dean wished he remembered was a man he could share with others. The man Dean actually remembered—Dean wasn’t sure he was even a man. He seemed more like a ghost, a mockery of the person John Winchester had been before Mary died. A walking, talking personification of regret. 

Like his son.

Getting up that morning felt like one of the hardest things he’d done in his life. He stayed in the shower for an extra twenty minutes, letting the noise of the water fill the emptiness in his head. At some point, Sam banged on the door and asked if he was going to be done anytime this century, so Dean wrapped himself in the safe armor of his clothes and braved a trip to the library.

He could have gone back to his room, but he didn’t want to allow himself to do that. As a kid, he’d known his dad’s pattern like the change of the seasons: after a bad night spent drinking and reminiscing about Mary, in the morning John would be gone. There would be some case or some other reason John wasn’t able to stay, and Dean and Sam would be left to fend for themselves. Back then, Dean never questioned his father’s reasons for leaving. Now, he wasn’t sure how many of those times John had left because of a case, and how many times John had left because he couldn’t bear being around his family.

Sam and Cas were perfectly capable of fending for themselves, of course. But even as a kid, Dean’s wish that his dad would come home had not only been about wanting John’s caretaking. He’d known that they were stronger as a unit; one member isolating himself weakened the entire pack. That had been true then, and it was true now.

The library table was covered in files, which wasn’t an uncommon sight. Sam’s ongoing cataloguing project meant that he’d leave his stuff out over night to come back to it in the morning. Usually, Dean would ignore it, just as he generally ignored Sam’s ambition to get their records in order. For the first time he wondered if he had a legitimate reason for that. Libraries weren’t great, but they’d be so much worse if the books weren’t in some sort of order. Information that wasn’t catalogued and accessible was next to useless, as evidenced by the Men of Letters records, which were sorted in what seemed like an attempt at abstract performance art more than a useful system.

He sat down in Sam’s chair and picked up one of the folders. It was a case file from 1926, something about a farmer whose crop kept dying. Someone had scribbled ‘unresolved’ on the first page. Dean noticed that the cataloguing number Sam had neatly printed on the front started with an X. He smiled. Thanks to Sam, they had their very own X-Files now.

Other files were sorted by monster or creature. There was an editor log included in every folder—a table listing editing dates and the editor’s name. Dean noticed how many of these Sam had edited in the beginning of last year. He remembered those months. He and Sam had barely spoken to each other, Sam spending every free minute neck-deep in the Men of Letters records. He’d felt like Sam was avoiding him on purpose, preferring to read dusty files over talking to his brother. Shame washed over him at the memory. Looking back, it was clear that Sam had been struggling, trying to deal with the consequences of what Dean had done. Sam had even reached out a couple of times, but Dean had been too busy justifying himself to respond. Thinking about it, he was lucky Sam even still looked at him these days.

“Hey. What’re you doing?”

Dean glanced up to see Sam standing in the library’s entrance, hair still damp from the shower and a concerned frown on his face. Dean quickly put the file back on the table and raised his hands. “Nothing. I didn’t touch anything. Well—I did. But I put it all back.”

Sam eyed him as he came up to him. Dean vacated the chair so Sam could sit down. “Since when do you give a crap about the Men of Letters files?”

Dean shrugged. “You’ve put a lot of work in these. It’s—I dunno. It’s actually pretty impressive.”

Sam huffed a laugh as he checked the order of the stacked files. “Right.”

“No, Sam—I mean it. I know I give you shit about it, but—well. I guess I shouldn’t.” Dean glanced over at the shelves in the side wings of the library, crammed full of boxes that weren’t even all of the Men of Letters records. “You’re doing good work. It’s not something I’d know how to do.”

Sam’s expression was guarded. With a pang, Dean realized that praise coming from him was so rare for Sam that he reacted with wariness rather than gratification. “Of course you know how to do it. Maybe you don’t know the LCC, but going through these files and categorizing them—it’s not hard.” Sam shrugged. “You just don’t want to.”

Dean opened his mouth to respond, but there wasn’t really anything he could say in protest. He didn’t want to—not even because he hated reading the files, but because this was something Sam had started. It hadn’t been Dean’s idea to get the records in order, so he didn’t want to help.

Man. Those were the actions of someone who was seven, not thirty-seven. Seven and immature.

He cleared his throat. “Uh. Need a hand?”

He ducked his head a little to catch Sam’s eyes. Sam’s expression was still wary, but there was also a slight glint in Sam’s eyes. Dean couldn’t quite place it, but it looked like something positive.

“Really?”

Dean nodded and grabbed a chair across from Sam. “Yeah, really. Just show me where the numbers go, and we’ll get through this twice as fast. Together.”

The glint in Sam’s eyes broke free into a smile. “All right.” Sam pushed one of the folder stacks across the table. “Read these. Note down type of monster, decade, location and number of victims for each. Once you’ve done that, I’ll tell you how to categorize them.”

“I’m on it.” Dean picked up the file at the top. The case was a ghoul incident, so disappointingly, it wasn’t an X-File. But he was sure there would be at least one of those in the stacks if he just kept going for long enough.

They spent the day reading files and categorizing them according to Sam’s system, which turned out to be of Sam’s own design. They were able to sort everything into existing categories with only one case that could have fit two different ones. To say Dean was impressed would have been an understatement. Over the course of the day, Sam loosened up enough to tell a few stories about how he’d made a student living at Stanford working as a college library assistant. One of them, which featured Sam covering a late shift and walking in on a freshman practicing penetration on a donut, had Dean laughing so hard he almost fell off his chair.

When the afternoon rolled around, Sam suggested they take a break so he could take the car into town before the farmer’s market shut down for the day. Dean agreed, surprised at how quickly the time had passed. Watching Sam as they were putting the boxes away, Dean’s cautious guess was that Sam had also had a good time.

He called Sam back just as he was about to leave.

“What?” Sam glanced over his shoulder.

“I, uh.” Dean shifted in his chair, then pushed himself up to stand a few feet closer. “I owe you an apology.”

Sam’s eyes narrowed. “For what?”

“For a lot of things. But—“ Dean frowned. “Mostly, I think, for—being Dad.”

Sam turned back around, his fingers clenching to nervous fists. “You think you’re Dad.”

“I think I’ve picked up a few bad habits from the man. Like—not listening.” When he met Sam’s eyes, he saw that a pained sadness had crept into them. “Or like doing reckless things ‘cos I can’t stand the idea that I fucked up. I did fuck up, Sam. In a bunch of ways.”

Sam glanced down, and the pain evident in Sam’s tense shoulders made him want to pull Sam into a hug. But he wasn’t sure it would be welcome. “Look—I know it’s not gonna be fixed within a day. Earning back trust takes time. I just hope it’s not too late. That I still have a chance to fix this.”

Sam raised his head, and Dean saw a bright glint in his eyes. “You’ll always have a chance to fix this, Dean. I just—will you? This time?”

“Yes.” He said the word with the resolve of years of terrified avoidance. “I promise, Sam. I’m gonna make it right. I don’t wanna be Dad. You deserve better.”

Sam was a good few inches taller, but right now he reminded Dean of little Sammy, terrified to his bones but determined not to let anyone see. “All right,” he said. “Let’s try it.”

Dean couldn’t help it, then, and wrapped his arms around Sam. After a moment, the surprised rigidity bled out of Sam’s body and his arms circled around Dean’s chest. Dean held on tightly for a few moments before he pulled back. “All right. Now go get your health food.”

Sam huffed a shaky laugh. “Yeah. You, uh. You need anything?”

“From the farmer’s market?” Dean shook his head. “Never.”

Sam smiled. “All right. Um. See you later.”

When Sam had turned the corner, Dean returned into the library. He walked along the table, then crouched down to run his finger over a small indentation in the floor. It was where the angel blade he’d slammed down next to Cas’ head had nicked the wooden boards.

He wished he didn’t remember that day, but it was clear as day: flinging Cas across the room, throwing him to the floor, and the fact that no matter how hard he’d landed his punches, Cas wouldn’t fight back. Dean’s chest clenched at the memory. Speaking to Sam had lifted some of the weight, but Sam wasn’t the only one he owed one whopper of an apology.

He got up and headed down the hallway to the bedrooms. Cas had recently moved into his own four walls—reluctantly so, but once Sam had promised that he could keep the TV, Cas had agreed. Outside the closed door, Dean could hear the TV set’s chatter. He was still amazed that considering all the addictions Cas could have fallen prey to, he had ended up as a TV junkie.

He knocked and entered when prompted. Cas was sitting near the foot of his bed. He’d shed the trench coat and jacket, his eyes hooded when he glanced at Dean.

“Hey there. You doing all right?”

“I’m fine.” Cas muted the TV. “Is there something you need?”

“Nope.” Dean sat on the edge of the bed. “Just checking in. What’re you watching?”

“ _Trading Spaces_. Matt and Tracy are decorating the Millers’ bedroom. Matt doesn’t stick to the budget and Tracy doesn’t understand that the Millers prefer quality over quantity.”

Dean smiled at Cas’ eager explanation. “I used to watch that. They never stick to the budget.”

Cas nodded gravely. “Watching it makes me wonder about this room,” he said after a while. “Am I expected to decorate it?”

It was admittedly a little bare. Cas didn’t sleep, so they hadn’t bothered to put any pillows on the bed. The lone dresser next to the door Cas had no use for, either, so it served as a TV cabinet. Over the back of the desk chair he’d tossed his jacket and coat, but the desk itself was unused. “I dunno.” Dean shrugged. “D’you like it like this?”

“I’m neutral on it. I don’t believe it has—warmth, though.”

The phrase was clearly something Cas had picked up from the show. Dean smiled. “We could drive to the Target in Lebanon. Get you a throw for the bed, or something.”

“Tracy bought a lava lamp. A cone-shaped illumination device filled with bubbles in different colors. Matt said it was tacky, but—“

“—you’d like one?”

Cas tilted his head. “I thought the swirls of the colors were soothing.”

“All right.” Fondness curled in Dean’s chest. “We’ll find you a lava lamp.”

“Thank you.” Cas smiled a small smile that was visible in his eyes more than anything. Dean glanced down at his fingers, trying to pluck up his courage. When Cas raised the remote, he quickly spoke up.

“I’m sorry for what I did.”

Cas threw him a confused glance. “What did you do?”

“I—I beat the shit outta you.” Dean shifted, but he wasn’t going to let himself wimp out. “And—I’ve been a really shit friend. For a really long time.”

Cas didn’t say anything, but Dean could see the surprise in the widening of his eyes. “Look—the Mark screwed with me. But that’s not—it’s not an excuse. And I still treated you like shit. When you lost your grace, and when the whole thing with the angels went down. I wasn’t there for you. I should’ve been.”

“You didn’t like that I was working at the Gas’n’Sip. And you thought that I was behind Metatron’s bombings. You said I would hurt people. Because I did last time.”

For anyone who didn’t know Cas, his voice would’ve just sounded neutral. But after seven years, Dean could hear the sadness in Cas’ tone. He shook his head.

“I’m sorry, Cas. I was being a jerk. The Mark made it worse, but it’s not—it’s not just that. Sometimes I say shit and I know it’s mean but it’s—I don’t know how to—“ He broke off. “I’m gonna change, Cas. I promise. I wanna be a better friend to you.”

Cas didn’t answer, and the silence stretched. When he finally spoke, his tone was contemplative. It seemed like he was trying to fit together the last few pieces of a puzzle. “I’ve always tried to do as you ask. Even when you don’t ask, I try to do as I think you would want me to. Your expectations in me have proved to be difficult to predict, though.” Cas met Dean’s eyes. “I suppose it’s nice to find out that your criticisms of me are, at times, unfounded. Even in your own mind. I do—wish. Sometimes. That you’d be clearer about what you see in me. If you see anything in me. I want to believe that you do, but—“

Cas trailed off, and Dean had to swallow around a tightness in his throat. He knew the feeling Cas was talking about. Leave it to him to make a being like Cas, eternal and powerful, feel like a worthless piece of shit. “You’re my friend.” The words came out thin, so he cleared his throat. “I trust you, Cas. Sometimes I’m a dick, but—I have the utmost respect for you. You’re the most stubborn, loyal son of a bitch I’ve ever met.” Dean wet his lips. “You’re a part of this family. Non-negotiable. And I’m gonna make it up to you, okay? That I’ve sometimes made you feel like you aren’t. I’m gonna make it up to you—double time.”

He held Cas’ eyes, willing Cas to understand all the things he wasn’t saying. The fact that most of the time, Cas had to do nothing but be in the same room with him to make him feel comforted. That more often than not, him snapping at Cas came from a desperate place of wanting to protect him and feeling he couldn’t. That watching Cas demonstrate confidence made his chest swell with pride, and that any time Cas wrinkled his brow in irritation at a human oddity, Dean’s stomach fluttered in fondness.

Cas wasn’t a mind reader, so he doubted Cas knew any of these things without Dean articulating them. Still, it seemed like maybe Cas was starting to get an idea as his lips pulled into a smile, fond and touched, and he indicated the space on the bed next to him.

“Would you like to join me? I believe the medium doesn’t have to be Netflix to allow—companionable chilling.”

Dean laughed, feeling his cheeks flush. “Uh. I, um. I will join you. But Cas—that phrase doesn’t mean what you think it means.”

Cas’ eyes narrowed in that one expression he had that could indicate anything from confusion over irritation to curiosity. “What does it mean, then?”

“Um.” Dean shook his head. “Doesn’t matter. I’ll tell you some other time. You wanna watch Matt and Tracy?”

Cas’ suspicious glint lingered, and for a few moments, Dean feared he’d have to explain the real meaning after all. But then Cas just inclined his head and picked up the remote. “Yes. Do you want to go back and watch it from the start?”

“Nah, I’ll be fine.” Dean pulled his legs up on the bed and settled down properly next to Cas. “If I don’t get something, you’ll explain it to me, right?”

“Of course, Dean.”

**Author's Note:**

> If any of these trigger you, please read with caution:  
> \- Protagonist getting suspended by his feet and having his personal space invaded (no genital touching)  
> \- Protagonist being told he's acting similar to the person who abused him, and that being true  
> \- Protagonist struggling with alcoholism, including severe emotional and mental addiction  
> \- Protagonist comfort eating (single, short mention)  
> If I've forgotten something here, please let me know and I'll add.


End file.
